Neptune
by akyaghmour
Summary: Randy Weir was chosen to be on a mission on Neptune. He only has three months to build his own rocket and fly back to earth. Is he going to be able to make it?
1. Chapter 1

Neptune

Chapter 1

All I remember is that we were taking a family picture and mom saying "SMILE." She clicked on the Camera's button, and as the flash hit my eyes, I totally went to a different world. A beautiful world. All I could see around me is gardens of flowers, birds singing on the trees, I see robins, I see bird's nests, Butterflies too. Everything that is fresh and clean. And now the wind is gently blowing and then the sun begins to shine… The Little white bunnies are getting out of their warrens…Suddenly I felt drops of water on my forehead, I looked up and realized it started raining. The storms' sound got louder. And in a second the snow filled the fields.. All the flowers were killed and the place that was once beautiful is gone. As my nose got frozen shut, I closed my eyes praying to God and then couldn't move anymore.

When I opened my eyes again, everything around me was dark and I heard my Wireless device "Hello there! We couldn't reach you on Earth so we decided to send you here. Randy Weir your mission on Neptune just started, and you only have three months to build your own rocket and fly back to earth."


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

Now I'm kind of used to the dark around me.

Whoever sent me here told me that I have to be able to live without eyesight, since the sunlight doesn't touch Neptune's core.

Still there is no big deal of it because based on science prediction "Neptune has large quantities of water ice mixed in with a largely hydrogen and helium atmosphere." So really I'm only feeling the water and smelling the gases... No need of vision to survive.

I have been drinking water for the whole day and not having any kind of food. I don't even know what do alien eat here on Neptune.. I wonder! maybe cannibal..

So I'm pretty much screwed...

But what to do?

Gotta survive.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

I really should think hard and try to remember how I ended up here, what did really happened to me after that flash camera hit my eyes? where did all the gardens of flowers and birds go?Was that just my imagination? my dreams? or is there a mysterious enigma behind it? hmm.. I really wanna know more about it. Hope I get answers soon.

For now I'm just going to predict a solution: A sudden lightning bolt affects the flash camera, causing me to levitate and vanish... And end up here on Neptune, and all I have to do is find a way out.

* * *

Two days passed, and I'm still in the same position, swimming around in an ocean of liquid hydrogen and helium in my Neptune's Space G divers (a full face dive mask with a visor light which allows you to easy breathe through your nose or mouth), slowly starving to death, and didn't sleep from the time I found myself here on this planet.

I'm tired of swimming. I'm tired of not being able to see around. I'm tired of not having a surface to stand on. I'm tired of not having answers to my questions. I'm tired of being alone. I'm tired of everything... And I want to go back home.

So for now I guess I should start thinking about the way of getting out of here. All I know is that _To escape Neptune's gravity and get out into space, a rocket has to travel at a speed of 52,800 mph or 23.6 km/sec._ WOW That's about 800 times faster than my parents are allowed to drive on highway. This is crazy and doesn't even help.

Maybe if I find the rocket that brought me here and fix it. I may be able to fly back home with it.


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4

Even though I froze to death, I was at least able to sleep. Yesterday I decided to do that, I took one of my heavy suits off which made my body lighter and was able to stay on surface without sinking.

I woke up today feeling a little better. Finding at least one solution to my problem calmed me down. I haven't eaten in 3 days, but it's okay Gandhi fasted for 21 days while in his 70s. And before those 21 days end, I'll probably have found food.

I wore my suit quickly and dive in looking for my rocket. It feels amazing to swim in between the clouds of water, and as you get deeper, it gets much less cold. I swam for hours and hours under the water without having any trouble breathing. While swimming I was thinking that when I get back to earth, the first thing I'll do is thank whoever invented this G diver, its fit and comfort are amazing.

Now I started to feel the warmness, I guess it's because I'm getting closer to the rocky core "As you go deeper into Neptune the gases most likely turn to liquids (water is one kind of liquid) made from the gases of hydrogen and methane. Deeper in the liquids most likely turn to solids of hydrogen and methane. Somewhere in the center maybe a core of rock, but we do not know." I remember reading this in of my _popular science_ magazines. Mom used to always tell me that whatever your paying for and reading is useless, nobody can ever go there. But here I am mom. On Neptune. All by myself. I wish you were here helping me. I miss you so much mom. Hope to see you soon.

A deep flash light reflected on my eyes and caused me to see some tall, thin, round vehicle, or.. rocket. yes a rocket. MY ROCKET!

I kept diving in. The rocket is currently about 40 feet away from me. I'm almost there. 15 more feet... Yet all at a sudden my mask started beeping, _Low battery, Low battery, Battery should be replaced now. beeep beeep beeep..._ The vent of my oxygen tank stopped reaching the vent of the mask, which means no more oxygen is reaching me. And as I felt my heavy body falling to the bottom, the flash light started fading away until all I saw was black again.

I cannot breathe in oxygen,

or

breathe out carbon dioxide,

...I am dying...


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

 _Good job Randy, first stage is now complete. You can find an extra space G diver, powered by a 9 volt battery and valid for 86 days (which is the time where you should be back on Earth). This new space G diver is attached to a visor light which allows you to see around on Neptune."_ I woke up on the sound of a radio...

What?

How could I be alive and.. and breathing? I opened my eyes and found myself inside my rocket.


	6. Part II

Chapter 8

"Good morning everyone, and thanks for coming" Linnet said while holding the mic in hand. "Today on CNN's Randy Weir Report: discussing the latest satellite imagery from Neptune. We now consider that Randy Weir became one of the most famous men and one of our greatest voyagers to Neptune. We have all twelve of our Neptune satellites taking pictures whenever his site's in view. The European Space Agency has both of theirs doing the same. And based on the latest EVAs, it look like he has finally found his rocket, and he's trying to fix it. Luckily he has water to last him for over a year, but has no food at all. However, we will try to supply him with food as soon as possible." ...Then I woke up

...Yes, it was just a dream

Chapter 9

It's day 10. I have a lot of work to do today, and the most important is to find a way to communicate with earth. I started exploring around in this mini rocket. I found water, a wireless, a radio, and many electronic things that I have no clue how to use. I totally found everything I was looking for, but food. I didn't find any kind of food. I'm depressed now. I know I'm gonna die of starvation. But I think I should forget about food for now. I mean even though I'm really hungry, I still have 11 days to live. And hopefully I'll find food before they end... I thought to myself, _those machines are here for purpose, they sent it with me, so I guess I have to learn how to use them to be able to communicate with Earth._ But how? I'm a technophobe. Yes. I'm someone who fears the effects of technology development. I also don't like to use it at all. Still, I'll do my best and try to use it. I have to. They have to know that I'm starving.

...I have to get back home.

Chapter 10

One of the computers I tried to open was attached to a 500-key windows keyboard (including Greek & English alphabetic characters, punctuation symbols, numbers, and a variety of function keys that I've never seen in my life). I pressed the big red key in the middle, and it opens up to this screen:

Length of a year: 60,190 days

Length of a day: 16.11 hours

Temperature(outside): -360 F

11.15 m/s² gravity

I stared at the numbers for along time trying to understand what would "the length of the day equals to 16 hours" mean? Doesn't it indicate that I have more days to live? Based on my math; on Earth you can live for 504 hours without food. However, here on Neptune you can live for 756 hours (31 days) without food. Which means I have more chances to live longer.

That's great!


	7. Chapter 13

Chapter 13

Randy is delighted to be able to communicate with Earth. He is finally able to tell his mom that he's doing okay here but still misses her too much. NASA can finally send him emails on where to go next, but it's just that they won't shut up. They want constant updates on every step he moves. It's because He's their second mission to Neptune. No actually first, since during the first mission, the rocket with the two astronauts exploded before reaching Uranus core. One of the emails NASA sent him was them asking him to grow plants to survive? are they crazy?


	8. Chapter 14 & 15

Chapter 14 & 15

Got my first e-mail from the commander today:

 _Randy, obviously we are very happy to here you survived._

 _you are our first astronaut who actually made it to Neptune._

 _I am myself very proud of you. I think I should tell you who I am._

 _I'm the IT specialist at NASA, and the person who's responsible for_

 _your situation. For now, NASA has a good rescue plan. I'm sure you_

 _you'll continue to show your unbelievable resourcefulness and_

 _get through this. Looking forward to hear more from you._

 _-Leonard_

My reply:

Mr Leonard, pure bad luck is responsible for my situation, not you.

You made the right call and saved everyone else; you brought me

on this mission to Neptune all alone. I know it was an order from

the captain, but you could have stopped him. Anyways all I want

right now is food. send me food. I'm starving.

 _..._ and the screen went black. My face went pale and all the joy from before shattered in the time span of a second. All the work and hope just vanished. I started breathing slowly and heavily because I knew in a matter of minutes I would literally freak out. Breathe in and out I told myself repeatedly. I could not resist to react, and shouted angrily at the black screen. I kept screaming until I became frustrated and decided to just silently accept the situation. Just when I was about to punch the glass of the one hope I had, an idea sprung into my mind. It must have been the energy that caused the sudden shutdown. I kneed down and carefully removed the top part of the system. I saw many cables and an old battery. I needed energy. I couldn't clearly see the inside so I moved to the right in order to have better lighting. LIGHT, that was the answer. I would have to take some light to get the power back on. And just with some of my capability I was able to fix it.

Thank you God.


	9. Chapter 16

Chapter 16

I knew I could smile when I heard the sound of the computer turning on.

The screen went white and I saw that I received another e-mail from the

commander. This time I remained calm, rather than being overly happy.

I stood up and clicked to see the new message. I was a human after all

so I started smiling brightly, when I saw that the commander was going

to fly over nutrients. It sounded like heaven to me in this moment. They

wanted to fly a rocket, without a landing system, towards Neptune and

then back to earth.

It's a pretty crazy/brilliant plan, I thought. Instead of launching the probe directly to Neptune, they'll send it to Hermes as it passes by Earth, giving them enough food and supplies to make it to here and will then use the Earth's gravity to slingshot back to Neptune and pick me up. Hey... that might actually work.


	10. Chapter 17

Chapter 17

For the rocket to reach me, I have to wait 16,490 day (on Neptune) which equals to only 100 days (on Earth). But a day on Neptune is only 16 hours long so when dividing the 16,490 day by 1.5, it'll be only 10,666. Therefore I have to find food that will last me for all those days. Or actually GROW FOOD.

* * *

Randy realizes he needs to survive until then. !),^^^(16,490) days! So he has to grow food.. Suddenly he remembers an old science project he did when he was in 1st grade where he grew lentils. Why not growing some lentils and see the results? Lentils are Low in calories and high in nutrition, also a great source of folate and magnesium, which are big contributors to heart health. Of all legumes and nuts, lentils contain the third-highest levels of protein. 26 percent of lentil's calories are attributed to protein, which makes them a wonderful source of protein for vegetarians and vegans, Lentils increase steady, slow-burning energy due its fiber and complex carbohydrates. Lentils are also a good source of iron, which transports oxygen throughout the body. And that is pretty much all he wants.

* * *

So I took a pot and put some dry,full and not split into two parts, lentils that I found in the rocket and added some cotton (which I got from my pillow). Then I kept it in a place where the cotton remained humid. I waited 3 days but nothing happened. no plants at all. I failed again. But I must survive. So I did the step all over again.

5 days after I did my second try, I woke up and found my lentils has grown. I could finally see the green. I'm so happy IT WORKED!


	11. Chapter 18

Chapter 18

I found water. I don't know how or when but it was there. For the first time I could smell the pureness of it and were entertained by it's non existing color. AT some times it looked blue and at others I could just look through it. I was showering. Laughing ad singing. The water opened all my pores and I felt new and hopeful. My senses were suddenly clear. I felt the temperature of the water flowing on my bare skin. It was warm or cold, somehow I don't know. I was so delighted, that I forgot the time. I knew I had to save the water and dropped pouring water over myself. Even though the joyful moment was short my heart was filled with satisfactions. I smile into the far until I suddenly saw a water coming from underneath the door. How? And suddenly it was over flowing the whole room. Then I woke up.

It was just a dream. A dream so amusing that I wasn't even mad. I could still feel the water and pretend the warmth I was desiring. I was happy in my heart. I don't know what illusion made me stand up, but the dream inspired me to look for a hot shower inside the rocket. I knew I wasn't going to find what I was looking for, but I was overly cheerful. I kept looking and obviously did not found what I was seeking for but I did find something interesting. The breath of soul- Music. A very old cassette and a recorder. I didn't have time to wonder why it was there because it was Disco time. I plugged in the cord and had to switch off the lights. I knew the place and how to move even when the lights were off. I took a broken pipe and imagined my dear wife. Me and my wife were showing off our great talent of how to dance badly.


	12. Chapter 19

Chapter 19

NASA was getting the four candidates ready to fly off. Jenny was the first candidate, on the front. A very well experienced women. Even though she was experienced in her job she wasn't a good mother. Her job was tearing her personal life apart and this mission wasn't doing her mother -daughter relationship any good. Martin was on the second position. The love bites on his neck weren't easy to overlook. looked like somebody was really going to miss him. On the third and fourth position were the closest sibling Jim and Sally. Both were leaving Families behind. Everybody was leaving something behind to go in the known unknown.


	13. Chapter 20&21

Chapter 20&21

The next morning was heavy. I knew it had been about 40 days that I couldn't receive a message from NASA because the screen wasn't working. A little smile from the dance before sleep hushed through my face. But then I got serious again. I would have to dimmer the lights even more to solve this problem. I worked on it throughout the day until I finally heard the little brum voice that told me I was in the game again. I saw a new message that told me that I had 59 days left for the food to arrive.

The next days were him telling his story of fixing the screen and sound system to communicate with NASA. Nasa had hired a psychologists to calm Randy down and go through a small therapy to mentally feel better. They were telling him about the preparations and the Food that will eventually travel to him. On one day when he was talking to the psychologist the voice starting cutting until it went completely off. He couldn't hear them anymore and he wasn't sure if they could.


	14. Chapter 22&23

Chapter 22&23

I was getting ready to my 12 day trip. NASA had ordered me to go to nawptu vallus, our meeting point. I would have to use the little shuttle. unfortunately the power could only cover 11 and a half of the 12 days. I would have to face a half day basically swimming and resisting the winds of Neptune. I packed my lentils and water in the shuttle. I turned off the lights tightened my suit and was ready to leave. I went into the shuttle straightened my back and flew off.

The first five days went without trouble but the fifth day the winds were very strong. The shuttle was swaying irregularly and he knew the risk of dying was very high.


	15. Chapter 24

Chapter 24

The shuttle was suddenly hit by something similar to rocks. I tried to take control but it seemed impossible. I was waiting for my life to flashback but it didn't. My heart was racing and felt like it was going to explode. Just when I thought there was no chance the winds became somewhat neutral again. I took control of the shuttle again and everything seemed OK for now.


	16. Chapter 25

Chapter 25

I can finally reconnect with NASA. In two days NASA and I will meet in nawptu vallus. And since the power of the shuttle could only cover 11 and a half of the 12 days, I would have to get ready for my 8 hour swimming and resisting the winds of Neptune. Hope nothing bad happens until I reach there.

To enjoy my last one and half day here I pulled my old cassette and recorder to listen to some music. I then got out my packed lentils and some water. The lentils tasted good, I had never tasted better one's than those. It was mushy and mature. I loved them.


	17. Chapter 26

Chapter 26

In my dreams I saw the same beautiful place I was in before coming to Neptune, but this time there was no rain or snow. I felt soft hands just like my mom's touching my forehead, I looked up and realized they were real. Yes my mom is here, and is everyone else. Everyone was talking to one another, except for my mom, she was looking at me and smiling the whole time, I heard her soft voice saying "thank God you're alive." I looked at her then closed my eyes hoping for this to be real. When I opened my eyes again, I was in the same place, mom holding my hands and everyone looking at me. I was confused. Am I back on Earth? Where's my shuttle? How did I get back?

The mom hugs her son tight and said "OH little Randy, you had one of your adventure dreams again, didn't you? Randy started crying and hugged his mom back.

The end


End file.
